Entries in Interview
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ABC News(NEW YORK) -- Two months after receiving the shocking diagnosis that he has multiple sclerosis, Jack Osbourne says he is doing “pretty good.”

The vision loss that caused doctors to diagnose the former reality-TV star and son of Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne with the chronic disease has eased and the one-time partier, who spent time in rehab for drug and alcohol addiction, says he’s leading a new, cleaner life.

“Since starting medication my vision is coming back slowly and, other than that, no side effects,” Osbourne, 26, said today on ABC’s Good Morning America.

“It’s kind of manageable,” he said of MS, an autoimmune disease that can leave sufferers with mild problems, including lack of muscle control or struggles with vision and balance, to serious disability, including paralysis. “Once you kind of learn about it, it’s just a bit of lifestyle change and I can live with that.”

Helping Osbourne to face the disease is a celebrity ally, Montel Williams. The talk show host announced his own MS diagnosis in 1999 and went on to found The Montel Williams MS Foundation to raise funds for research.

“Montel has been a really great source of information because he’s so knowledgeable about MS,” Osbourne said. “He’s had it for a long time and he’s very active in the world so he’s kind of my go-to guy when anything comes up.”

When Osbourne first received his MS diagnosis, just weeks after his fiancé, Lisa Stelly, gave birth to the couple’s first child, Pearl Clementine, it was not Williams but another celebrity who came to his mind.

“I instantly thought Richard Pryor,” he said, referring to the late comedian whose MS left him confined to a wheelchair. “So I thought death sentence, that’s it. I’ll be in a wheelchair in a couple of years and game over.”

“But the more research you do, you know, unfortunately Richard Pryor had a bad case of MS. There’s different kind of classes of MS and he had the most aggressive,” Osbourne said. “I have relapsing-remitting MS. It’s the most common and the least aggressive.”

Osbourne’s diagnosis is allowing him to control the disease and its symptoms with lifestyle changes and his new “adapt and overcome” motto towards life.

“It’s stuff like minimize stress. Eat as healthily as you can. Get as much sleep as you can,” he said. “It’s kind of the recipe for good living.”

He’s also plowing ahead with his career, working on a new show called Haunted Highway for the SyFy channel and moving past the disappointment of being fired from a job he had booked just as he was diagnosed.

“I started a production company last year and we’re producing a show for NatGeo Wild called Alpha Dogs about guys who train dogs for the military and police,” he said. “And last year I did the documentary about my dad [God Bless Ozzy Osbourne] and that’s airing on Showtime.”

ABC News(NEW YORK) -- Charlie Sheen has been to the edge and back in the past year after his public meltdown led to his being fired from his hit sitcom Two and a Half Men.

Now a calmer version of Sheen – once the highest-paid actor in television – is back with a new sitcom, Anger Management, debuting Thursday night on FX, in which he plays, not without irony, an anger management therapist.

“What do you think?” Sheen said today on ABC’s Good Morning America, when asked if his new role is much of a stretch. “It’s nice to be in the chair and not the couch.”

The couch is where Sheen, 46, spent much of the past year in rehab after his career imploded in a string of headline-making incidents including a series of bizarre interviews in which he claimed to be a “warlock,” said he possessed “tiger blood and Adonis DNA,” and characterized his erratic behavior as “winning!”

When allegations arose that drugs were behind his erratic behavior he denied any substance abuse problems but claimed to be on the drug “called Charlie Sheen.” Today the new Sheen, recently cast to play the president in Robert Rodriguez’s Machete sequel, says he is not on any drugs but hasn’t been able to kick his other habit, alcohol.

“We live in a country where it’s always Miller Time so what are you going to do? It’s happy hour somewhere in the world,” Sheen said.

His time in rehab was not a first for Sheen, who has had several run-ins with the law for domestic abuse and drug allegations over the years, but it was possibly his last.

“I don’t believe in rehab anymore,” Sheen said today on GMA. “It’s not for me. It’s not for everyone. It’s not a one-size-fits-all and it didn’t fit me.”

“My biggest regret is going a little too far,” Sheen said. “The key for me would have been the advice I got when I was in anger management myself for a year and that is you can always leave the room.”

Sheen’s erratic behavior and firing led to a lawsuit with CBS and a very public feud with Men creator Chuck Lorre. Reports from the Anger Management set have been nothing but positive which is how Sheen says he wants his TV legacy to end.

Like he did on Men and the sitcom Spin City before that, Sheen plays a version of himself, a character again named Charlie, on Anger Management. He has said his planned role in the upcoming Roman Coppola film, A Glimpse Into the Mind of Charles Swan III, in which he, again, plays a “Charlie” will be the last time audiences see that similarity.

Don’t put it past Sheen, however, to turn his year of turmoil into commercial success.

“It is odd to look at some of the clips and some of the stuff and think, ‘Wow that was me, that was me. Wow,’” he said. “It’s a crazy character study on some level that will hopefully be valuable in the future.”

Summit Entertainment, LLC(NEW YORK) -- Kristen Stewart says her experience with the Twilight saga gave her insight in playing Snow White in the new movie Snow White and the Huntsman.

Stewart tells the June issue Interview magazine her character feels a “debilitating isolation” because she’s been locked away in a little cell for seven years, and the 22-year-old actress says she could definitely “relate to that.” Stewart tells the magazine, “The fans and people who loved Twilight, they do put you on this sort of different plane where you're not real. It's like you don't exist.”

Snow White and the Huntsman also stars Charlize Theron as the evil Queen Ravenna. Stewart says she only had a few shooting days with Theron, but she enjoyed discovering they share the same approach to acting. Stewart tells Interview, “We only had a few days together but we both are absolutely willing to hurt ourselves to do what it takes to get the right feeling, and not all actors are like that.” Stewart adds, “Most actors like to be really comfy.”

Theron tells Interview she can relate to her character's obsession with her looks and mortality, but turning to surgery to keep her youthful appearance is not an option for her right now. “I can’t foresee myself ever going under the knife, but then again, I’m only in my mid-thirties. Maybe it's different when you're in your mid-sixties. So I don’t want to make statements about where I’m gonna be in 30 years,” says Theron.

ABC/Ida Mae Astute(NEW YORK) -- Kevin Costner and the late Whitney Houston formed a unique friendship, thanks to co-starring in the 1992 romantic thriller The Bodyguard, which became the second highest-grossing film worldwide when it was released. On Thursday's Good Morning America, Costner admitted that although Houston's family asked him to give her eulogy after her death in February, he was nervous about his remarks.

"You can't be everything to everyone and how people choose to deal with it is something I was speaking to in the room," Costner said of his funeral address. "Oprah was in the room and Diane Sawyer and all those people I wish were up there speaking instead of myself. What was I going to say?"

The 57-year-old actor and director figured out exactly what to say, crafting a heartwarming eulogy that spoke of his and Houston's similarities growing up in Baptist churches. Costner also spoke of Houston's insecurities as a public figure -- anxieties that led to her drug use.

"I saw pretty much what everybody else saw," Costner said of Houston's drug use. "I was asked a couple times by closer friends of hers to write her a note. I did. ...I don't know if she ever read them."

"She was a very important person to me," Costner declared. "The world has connected us in a way that we'll never not be."

ABC/ Ida Mae Astute(NEW YORK) -- Lady Gaga wants to have kids one day. In a new preview of Oprah’s Next Chapter, the singer tells host Oprah Winfrey that she’s eager to start a family eventually: “I want kids, I want a soccer team and I want a husband.”

Gaga clarified that she doesn’t actually want enough children to form her own soccer team. She’d be thrilled with “a few.”

Gaga also said she wants to “experience” a pregnancy, but isn’t ready to have a kid yet.

The episode of Oprah’s Next Chapter — which also features an interview with Gaga’s mom and footage from last month’s launch of their Born This Way Foundation at Harvard University — airs Sunday on OWN at 9 p.m. ET.

Paul Zimmerman/Getty Images(NEW YORK) -- Two days after it was announced that the former queen of daytime talk Oprah Winfrey had nabbed Bobbi Kristina’s first interview since the death of her mother Whitney Houston, Winfrey’s network released a trailer for the upcoming interview showing Winfrey comforting the 18-year-old girl.

“The world lost an icon, they lost a mother and a sister,” Winfrey says in the trailer, while a picture of Houston with her sister-in-law Patricia Houston and daughter Bobbi Kristina is shown.

Winfrey’s interview with Houston’s family, including her brother Gary and his wife Patricia, the singer’s manager, will air on Oprah’s Next Chapter at 9 p.m. Sunday on OWN. It’s the family’s first sit-down interview since the singer’s sudden death Feb. 11.

In the trailer, Winfrey refers to Bobbi Kristina as “the love of Whitney’s life, her only child.”

According to a network press release, Houston’s daughter will share “personal memories of her mom and how she would like the iconic superstar to be remembered.”

“The family also addresses the rumors and speculation surrounding Houston’s death,” the press release said.

According to TMZ, Bobbi Kristina told friends that she agreed to sit down with Winfrey because she “was loyal to my mom, and never did my mother wrong, or made her look bad. She always looked out for my mom.”

Before the interview, OWN will re-air its special, “Remembering Whitney: The Oprah Interview,” which features the singer’s 2009 interview on The Oprah Winfrey Show and Winfrey’s personal memories of Houston.

TMZ reports Bobbi Kristina has said Oprah "was loyal to my mom, and never did my mother wrong, or made her look bad. She always looked out for my mom."

The gossip site speculates that for this reason, the teen may feel Winfrey may avoid any controversy during the sit-down, steering clear of Bobbi Kristina's rumored drug use. It's not known if she's getting paid for the interview, which will air on OWN this Sunday at 9:00 p.m. Eastern time.

Winfrey will also chat with Houston's sister-in-law and manager, Patricia Houston, and the late singer's brother, Gary Houston, during the installment of Oprah's Next Chapter.﻿

ABC/Ida Mae Astute(NEW YORK) -- Nick Cannon revealed for the first time the severity of the health scare that forced him to step down from his daily radio show and the lifestyle changes he's been forced to make since being hospitalized twice this year for kidney-related problems.

"I scared a lot of people. I scared myself," Cannon said Monday on ABC’s Good Morning America in his first morning television interview since being hospitalized in Aspen, Colo., in January.

Cannon, 31, was hospitalized while on vacation with his wife, Mariah Carey, and their 10-month-old twins. He was transferred from Aspen to a Los Angeles-area hospital where he was diagnosed with kidney failure.

"The technical term is lupus nephritis," he said. "It's a rare form of lupus that's just attacking my kidneys. They thought it was just kidney disease and then they were trying to figure out why my immune system was attacking my kidneys and that was sort of the root of it all."

Just weeks later the America's Got Talent host found himself back in the hospital again when doctors discovered he had blood clots in his lungs and an enlarged heart.

"My kidneys were in tip-top shape but I started to feel pain again," Cannon said. "And because of my schedule and everything I had a few blood clots in my lungs which then affected my heart as well. A lot of people have passed away from that and the doctor said luckily I was in such great shape and taking care of myself because a lot of people have been taken down by it."

According to the National Institutes of Health, the disease Cannon was diagnosed with, lupus nephtritis, is an autoimmune disease that affects approximately three out of every 10,000 people. Left untreated, it could worsen to kidney failure.

To avoid that fate, Cannon, he revealed, has been ordered by doctors to make dramatic lifestyle changes, both professional - he announced Feb. 17 that he would step down as host of his daily radio show - and personal.

"I have been ordered to sleep at least six hours a night," he said. "They say rest is probably the best medicine. I'm dealing with it. Of course I'm not used to the medicines, but I feel like I'm starting to figure out a lot of holistic ways, meditation and stuff to get through it."

To get through the other most dramatic lifestyle change, the diet, Cannon revealed he relies on his wife, whom he calls, "Dr. Carey."

"The diet is the worst part," he said. "I can't have any fast food anymore…no Happy Meals, nothing."

"She made me an egg-white sandwich before I left the house this morning," he said of Carey. "Those are the things I have to be eating now, no more bacon. She takes care of me, makes sure I'm eating what I'm supposed to be."

Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images(NEW YORK) -- At the height of his success, Davy Jones could set girls screaming, but the Monkees frontman was just as excited by his own fame, his friend and bandmate Micky Dolenz recalled.

“We shared a house together in the early days and we were driving up to and parking in front of our house and listening to the radio and it was Monkee Day and all of a sudden ‘Last Train to Clarksville’ came on,” Dolenz said, referring to the band’s debut single. “He said, ‘Whoa, that’s us.’”

Dolenz appeared on ABC’s Good Morning America on Thursday to remember Jones, the lead singer of The Monkees who died Wednesday morning at the age of 66 after suffering a heart attack at his home in Florida.

“None at all,” Dolenz said when asked if he had any hints that Jones might be sick. “He’s a vegetarian. He was always outdoors with horses.”

“His mom, I remember, passed on when he was very young and then his father also passed on in the very early days of the Monkees and I believe it was a heart attack. So I believe maybe there was some genetic issue, but nothing we ever knew about,” he said.

Dolenz said he and Jones remained in close touch until the very end, most recently performing together in a reunion tour last year throughout the U.K. and the U.S.

Dolenz and Jones first met in the 1960s when they were cast alongside Peter Tork and Michael Nesmith in The Monkees, the band formed as part of a TV series about a rock band also called “The Monkees.”

The show was canceled in 1968, but it cemented the four men, particularly Jones, as teen idols and remained a cult classic well past its cancellation, fueled by reunion tours and memorabilia.

ABC/RICHARD CARTWRIGHT(LOS ANGELES) -- Charlie Sheen’s bizarre departure from Two and a Half Men may feel like long ago, but show creator Chuck Lorre is still living the nightmare.

“It was a painful year,” he said in a new interview with TV Guide. “I’ll be sorting it out for a long time.”

“I offered to quit the show last winter,” Lorre revealed. “I said, ‘Listen, if for some reason I’m now the Antichrist I’m happy to leave. It’s not in my interest to stop the show, and I certainly don’t want to put all these people out of work. Keep going. Get another guy. Don’t stop on my account.’”

It wasn’t the first time he thought about quitting TV’s No. 1 comedy. Lorre said he regrets not leaving after Sheen was accused of holding a knife to his then-wife, Brooke Mueller, on Christmas 2009.

Lorre said he, Warner Bros. and CBS made, “a moral decision as opposed to a financial one” to get Sheen off the show.

“But people were really frightened that they were signing off on what could have had devastating consequences,” he said. “This was not a game. This was drug addiction writ large. This was big-time cocaine and in his own words, an ‘epic drug run’ that could have ended with either his death or someone else’s.”